


Something You Miss

by mxx



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Age Difference, Anal Sex, Blow Jobs, Canon Compliant, Canonical Character Death, Frottage, Intercrural Sex, M/M, Marco Bott & Jean Kirstein Friendship, Pederasty
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-11-16
Updated: 2015-11-15
Packaged: 2018-02-25 14:05:31
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 5
Words: 12,595
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2624522
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mxx/pseuds/mxx
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Per an old-fashioned military custom and the wishes of his parents, Jean is taken into the tentative care of a young officer, Erwin Smith, for the duration of his training, a decision which alters his view of the world and himself for better or worse.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I've been writing this as a fill for a kink meme prompt, and even though I'm not finished I'd like to go ahead and start cross-posting what I do have written here.
> 
> Contrary to what I said on the kink meme (because I can't do math), I've messed with the timeline a bit so that Jean & co become trainees when they're fourteen and join the survey corps when they're seventeen. Please be aware that there will eventually be graphic sexual content involving Jean and Erwin, and implied sexual relationships between other characters.
> 
> The title is taken from the saddest Taylor Swift song I could find.

“Hold still, Jean.”

Jean squirms anyway. It’s too hot at this time of year for his parents to expect him to just sit still in these itchy, over-starched clothes that smell like they came from his grandfather’s old chest of hand-me-downs. He can’t suffer through another second of them, let alone through the remaining half hour they have until their guest arrives.

Although he doesn’t even know who their guest is or why she’s coming to call, it’s not that hard for him to hazard a guess. The situation being what it is in the walls now, his family, like many, is desperate enough to do whatever it might take to continue being able to feed his grandmother and his younger siblings, even if it means sending him away to lessen the burden. Even if it means setting him up in an arranged marriage with the daughter of a wealthy family, however that would work.

Jean isn’t having any of it. He’s not a fool; he knows how to steal food and even actual money if it should come to that. He’d much rather be a thief than a trinket for some rich family he doesn’t know anything about to spirit away and groom into a laughable approximation of a husband for their daughter.

He does at least hold his tongue while his mother blots the sweat from his face with a handkerchief. She seems rather calm about the fact that she’s about to sell her own child off like livestock. Although Jean’s mother isn’t sentimental or sweet she loves her family in her own gruff way and has made sure they’ve never doubted it. Jean feels more than a little miffed at her apparent lack of remorse.

“. . . This is stupid,” he finally mumbles. His father shushes him and continues pacing in their small sitting room while clutching his pocket watch to his chest. He looks at Jean’s mother.

“Perhaps we should have a talk with the boy before he gets here,” he says, as if it wasn’t already glaringly obvious they should have explained things to Jean before now.

“. . . He?” Jean repeats, indignant.

“Yes, darling. He’s a good man,” his mother replies, looking at him thoughtfully before producing a comb out of nowhere and tackling his sweat-slicked hair with it. She’s never called him “darling” before and it irritates him even more than the heat and the clothes. That settles it—he’s going to run away as soon as the opportunity presents itself.

After what feels like an eternity there comes a sharp knock on the door that his father hurries to answer. Jean can’t see the door from his chair. He can hear voices though, all of them low and deep and serious. He hears “recruit” and “your son” and then “titans” and takes in a sharp breath that does nothing to assuage the dizzy spell that comes over him. His parents aren’t marrying him off—they’re sending him away to _military training_.

He could throw a tantrum, except now that he’s fourteen-going-on-fifteen he’s a little too proud for that, especially when two strange, imposing men step into the room looking almost like titans themselves. One of them is balding and old, in his fifties at least. While he’s short and thickset like Jean’s father, his mass attests to a lifetime of hard, physical labor outdoors rather than one in a bakery. The other man is surprisingly young to have the kind of grim, world-weary look on his otherwise handsome face that he does. He’s the tallest person in the room, taller even than Jean’s mother.

The balding man addresses Jean’s father. He explains everything Jean already knows about what happens when you become a trainee. After three years you can do the sensible thing and join the wall garrison, or do the ideal thing and join the military police if you place high enough, or do the crazy thing and join the survey corps and be dead within a few months.

“I think I’d rather be married off after all,” Jean mutters as he tugs at his collar.

The balding man grimaces in an amused sort of way. “You’d rather get married at your age than join the military?”

“Yeah, I would,” Jean says, oblivious to his parents’ frantic motions for him to be quiet and behave himself. “You’ve never done a damn thing for us besides waste our tax money and make it hard for civilians like us to get by. You’re why my family is in this position.”

“I can’t say you don’t have a point there, son,” the balding man says. He glances at his companion, who looks at Jean almost coldly. It’s not out of malice, Jean realizes as he stares right back. The man’s eyes are a striking shade of pale blue, a stark contrast to his dark, suntanned skin. “Erwin here is from the survey corps. Fine soldier, sharp as a whip. You couldn’t ask for a more capable suitor. A tad frigid, maybe, but capable.”

_Suitor?_ Jean thinks, horrified to learn that his parents are simultaneously marrying him off _and_ sending him to the military.

The balding man laughs. “I’ll tell you now, son, if you aren’t careful he’ll lead you straight to the survey corps and into an early grave.”

“That’s enough, Gerhard,” Erwin says. His expression and tone are both flat, almost soft, and yet Jean gets worse chills down his spine than if he’d reacted angrily. He speaks to Jean then. “I’m a friend of your parents’, Jean. If you do decide to enlist in the military then I promise to be there with you for as long as you need me.”

Jean is suspicious immediately. He shakes Erwin’s hand, his own small and almost delicate in Erwin’s stronger, callused grip, and wonders how much of a hassle it would be to steal a horse, run away to a forest down in Wall Maria, and spend the rest of his life as a hermit.

His parents put an end to those delusions during dinner. The atmosphere is subdued and stifling, at least for Jean and his three younger siblings, who keep their mouths shut for once. The adults talk amongst themselves. Jean’s grandmother in particular keeps up a lively conversation about the current goings-on in Hermiha—she’d been born and raised there, and if she hadn’t married Jean’s mother’s father she would never have set foot in Trost, much less started a business and a family.

Jean doesn’t eat a bite. Now that the time has come he feels a little ill at the prospect of leaving home, presumably for good, and not even having a decent amount of time to get used to the idea. He’s not sure if any amount of time would have been enough.

The only one who takes Jean’s feelings on the matter into consideration is Erwin, and even then he doesn’t speak to Jean so much as look at him from time to time over the course of the meal, as if sporadically remembering that Jean exists and might be upset. For all of his talk of being there for Jean if he needs him, it seems to Jean that Erwin is just as uneasy being in this situation as he is.

Jean decides he’ll have to instigate things. “So am I marrying you, then?” he asks quietly under the conversation and clatter of utensils. He’s seated right across from Erwin. Their feet are crowded up together under the table, which lets Jean feel the tenseness in Erwin’s legs, how his feet shuffle a bit at the question.

Erwin’s expression is indecipherable. “Of course not,” he says, though not in a way that insults Jean’s intelligence or, more importantly, his ego.

“He called you a suitor,” Jean says, a touch accusing.

“He didn’t mean a suitor in that sense.” Erwin pauses. “Well, no. I suppose he did, in a way.” He pushes back from the table, taking care not to jostle Jean’s sisters where they’ve seated themselves on either side of him, and gestures for Jean to follow him. His family is casual about meal times, even when guests are over; his mother catches his eye, but she doesn’t say anything to stop Erwin from leaving. Jean gets up and hurries after Erwin to the front door.

It’s almost dusk now, the sun barely more than a hazy red-orange smear in the gaps between the surrounding rooftops. Jean undoes the top three buttons of his grandfather’s shirt and tugs at it again, trying to circulate some air. Erwin looks out of place where he stands with one foot on the bottom step of the stairs leading down from the door and one foot on the road. He’s too big, too . . . unfamiliar. He doesn’t belong in Trost, where the houses are average and the people as a general whole aren’t particularly poor or rich. The green survey corps cloak stretched across his broad shoulders is an anomaly, an emblem of something Jean has never had any use for.

Erwin looks back at him. “We have a custom in the military,” he says gently, as if Jean is a skittish animal he doesn’t want to scare away, “where senior officers can take recruits under their care and oversee their training. No, it’s more complicated than that . . . it’s almost like a courtship, I suppose. It’s supposed to build trust between our soldiers and make us a stronger whole.”

“That’s dumb,” Jean says, huffing out a breath to push his sweat-matted bangs away from his forehead. “I don’t know a thing about you. How’m I supposed to trust you?”

“The same way I’m supposed to trust you. We would have to figure it out together.”

Jean weighs his options, then shrugs. “Whatever. It’s not like I can change my parents’ minds now, not after they’ve decided this for me like they always do.” He can’t keep the anger out of his voice. He knows it’s childish and petty to resent his parents for doing what parents are supposed to do. He doesn’t care.

Erwin continues to look at him. It’s starting to get on Jean’s nerves. It makes him feel like a bug caught in a jar, something to be scrutinized without any regard to his own feelings on the matter. He’s just opened his mouth to give this guy a piece of his mind when Erwin says, “We feed you in the military. We clothe you. We give you a place to stay. You earn every bit of it, of course, and most days you’re going to resent it. You’re going to hate it and be miserable and you’re going to wish you could come back home and be a child again. But for two years at least I can promise that your life will be stable. Once you pick a branch to serve in we pay you. I think your parents are trying to provide for you, since they don’t know how long they’ll be able to provide for the rest of your family.”

He says it as if Jean hasn’t already figured it out, which he has. And maybe it’s ungrateful of him to still be mad at his parents despite knowing that, but he’s not going to admit that he’s in the wrong out loud and he’s certainly not going to do it to a stranger.

He shuts his mouth and grinds his teeth for a bit. Swallows his pride. “ _Baumkuchen_.”

Erwin’s eyebrows bunch together quizzically.

“I like _baumkuchen_ ,” Jean elaborates, crossing his arms. “My parents are bakers and I like to eat their cake. Now you tell me something about yourself.”

“I see. My name is Erwin Smith,” Erwin replies in that low, unassuming voice of his that nonetheless makes Jean feel like something’s tugging at him, compelling him to watch every minute movement Erwin makes as he sets both feet on the road. “I’m scared of heights.”

Jean bristles. “You’re lying. How can you be in the survey corps if you’re scared of heights?”

When Erwin meets his gaze evenly Jean feels goose bumps prickle along the back of his neck. “Drive, I suppose. Motivation. I have a goal for which I’m willing to do anything to achieve. When I’m in the air I focus on it until I forget that my feet aren’t touching the ground.”

“You’re more scared of _heights_ than you are of titans?” Jean’s not oblivious—Wall Maria fell almost two years ago, kicked down by a massive titan. Even now there are still refugees from all the districts in Wall Maria pouring into Trost and other districts in Wall Rose every day, bringing with them little money and fewer possession but enough horrific stories, some of them almost too horrible and outlandish to be entirely true, to last a lifetime. They sound almost like figures from the ghost stories Jean tells his younger siblings to scare them when they won’t behave.

Erwin nods, then glances to the side. Jean follows his gaze. His mother’s pulled the curtains aside and is peering out at them through the window, with that frown on her face that says it’s time for Jean to come help clean up the aftermath of dinner and keep his siblings entertained. After she pulls the curtains back together Jean rolls his eyes.

Erwin comes back up the steps, pausing when Jean doesn’t budge from in front of the door. Jean bites his lip, seized with a silly idea that, once conceived, just won’t go away no matter how hard he tries to ignore it.

“If you’re a suitor then that means you have to earn my favor, right?” he asks cautiously as he leans back against the door and swallows once, twice. “That means you ought to give me a gift or something, right?”

“That sounds reasonable, yes.” 

“Then kiss me.”

Erwin stands there, his expression cryptic, and for a horrible moment Jean thinks he’s either going to say no or just ignore him entirely. Then he steps forward, almost crowding Jean against the door but not quite, and leans down. He’s so tall that Jean’s eyes are almost level with his sternum, provided he stretches up on his toes, which he does. He’s never kissed anyone before, not in a way that counts, and kissing the girl down the street when they were eight years old and pretended to be married _definitely_ does not count. He’s seen his parents kissing before when they thought no one was looking, and he’s curious about why it’s such a big deal, what it feels like.

All he knows is that you’re supposed to close your eyes, so he does, and jumps in mild fright when something that feels suspiciously like lips touches the top of his head through his hair. He knocks right up into Erwin’s jaw. Erwin straightens up and touches his mouth with one hand, the other one surreptitiously slipping past Jean to the door handle.

“Wh—” Jean stammers, his pulse thudding hard in his ears, “what was _that_?”

“A goodnight kiss,” Erwin says, as if it should be obvious. He looks astonishingly young when he isn’t frowning quite as hard as he was earlier. Jean feels cheated, and starts working himself up to tell Erwin so when Erwin continues, “You have to earn my favor too, Jean,” and opens the door. He steps past Jean and pauses just long enough to glance back. “We’re leaving at sunrise. Sleep well.”

He leaves the door open and is intercepted by Jean’s mother before he’s taken more than a half dozen steps. Jean stares dumbly after him, his face hot and his ears hotter. He can’t believe his parents are sending him off with this guy. 

Later that night, while he’s lying awake and trying to give his siblings as wide a berth he can manage on the cramped mattress they share, he thinks that maybe it won’t be so bad. He still doesn’t trust Erwin, isn’t sure if he even likes him yet. But he’s intrigued. He wants desperately to know what Erwin is like underneath that icy stare and his maddening way of tripping Jean up no matter what he does. He’s going to find out, he resolves, and he’s going to find out soon.


	2. Chapter 2

Jean’s first day with Erwin is one long, painful readjustment. He isn’t used to being woken up before sunlight, much less by his mother setting a rucksack on his stomach. He sits up groggily and pats the rucksack for several dazed minutes before he even begins to process why it’s here, and then it hits him like a slap across the face: he’s leaving home today. In the rucksack he can feel all of the few clothes he owns, a splintery lump that must be his brother’s little wooden horse their father carved for him, and a wrapped bundle of leftover rolls.

After she sees that he’s up and dressed, his mother picks her way across the room with quiet, practiced ease. Jean stumbles after her, leaving the floorboards all groaning behind him. One of his sisters mumbles sleepily and rolls over into his vacated part of the mattress. He doesn’t linger in the doorway like he feels he should, just shoulders the rucksack and tries not to yawn.

Erwin and Gerhard are already waiting outside by their horses. Jean hopes that his hasty goodbye to his parents on the doorstop will suffice, but of course his mother has to drag him back so she can straighten up his collar and tell him to make sure he washes behind his ears, and then his father has to pull him into a bone-crushing hug that squeezes the breath out of him.

Erwin helps him up on the horse, his grip strong and firm. Jean’s never ridden a horse before, hasn’t ever even be near one before now. Horses are for mounted members of the military police and the survey corps and farmers and travelers, not for a son of bakers whose whole world up until today could be walked across within the span of a few hours.

They leave Gerhard behind in the town divided from Trost by Wall Rose. He was a member of the wall garrison, Erwin explains once he’s gone his separate way, and had only accompanied him to Jean’s house as “dissuasion.”

“Dissuasion?” Jean repeats. As they pass through the town and reach open road Erwin urges the horse faster. Jean holds tight around his waist, hoping he won’t fall off or throw up or do anything equally embarrassing.

“Your parents are horrified of the possibility that you might join the survey corps because of me,” Erwin says bluntly. “I’m sure they asked Gerhard to be present to ridicule or scare the notion right out of you. As you’ve seen, he doesn’t hold the survey corps in too high esteem.”

“I’ve never wanted to join the survey corps anyway!” Jean says, irritated that his parents have to meddle even now. “I’m not an idiot.”

Erwin says nothing in response and Jean realizes a few beats too late that he’s just insulted the man responsible for keeping him from toppling off the horse. He feels he ought to apologize, but as the silence stretches on even further the prospect just seems more and more awkward, so he doesn’t.

“. . . Y’know, training doesn’t even start for another few months, so how come I have to leave with you this early?”

“Your parents and I thought it would be easier if you had some time to readjust without having to worry about training. I’m sure it’s going to be particularly tough now that the walls have been breached and our need for recruits is more urgent than ever.” 

“Would’ve been nice to have some time to readjust to the very idea in the first place,” Jean says scathingly.

More silence. He wonders why that’s Erwin’s go-to response for when he’s been insulted. Maybe it happens so often it’d be too tiring for him to reply every single time. Jean starts talking again before his brain gets a chance to tell his mouth to stop. “And it suuure would’ve been nice to have some time to say goodbye to all of my friends.” It’s a lie if he’s ever told one. He doesn’t have any friends.

“I’m sorry,” Erwin says finally, and he sounds quite sincere, which catches Jean by surprise. “I was under the impression they were consulting you the whole time.”

“They’ve never mentioned you, ever,” Jean mutters. “How do you know them, anyway?”

Erwin goes silent again. If he doesn’t want to answer the least he could do is say so, Jean thinks. Well, whatever. They’ve only been riding for an hour or so and he can already tell it’s going to be an exhausting day. Once the sun is fully up it gets warmer, and the horse smell starts to aggravate his allergies, and then he remembers he didn’t eat breakfast. He’s cranky and miserable by noon, and even though he keeps his mouth shut Erwin must notice, because when they dismount for a break he stays as far away from Jean as possible without overtly avoiding him. Or that’s how to looks to Jean, anyway. He’s not really bothered by it, considering how often it happens.

“Are we there yet?” he asks between mouthfuls of roll, though it’s perfectly obvious that they aren’t. In every direction the land stretches green and undisturbed by houses or other travelers as far as the eye can see. The well-worn road is the only indication that they’re still within the confines of the walls.

“We won’t reach Ehrmich until tomorrow, so we’ll find a village along the way to spend the night at.” Erwin faces one direction and squints. “If we go northwest we’ll reach Hildebrand by nightfall.

Jean doesn’t know how he can tell that without looking at a map, but it’s not like he has a better idea of where they are or where they should go, so he eats another roll without comment.

Erwin doesn’t say much or really anything at all for the rest of the afternoon. Neither of Jean’s parents have the most even tempers, so he isn’t sure how much longer he can put up with this much calm and patience. Around dusk they begin to pass farms, and then clusters of houses, until all at once they’re in the heart of what must be Hildebrand. It’s not as cramped and busy as Trost, which makes Jean feel almost lonely.

In comparison to the streets, the inn is relatively noisy and crowded. Most of the low conversation turns to unsubtle, derisive comments about Erwin’s survey corps cloak when he walks in and makes his way to the bar. Jean tries to follow closely behind him as best he can, but there are so many people that they’re separated. When a farmer scoots his chair back and gives him a drunken grin, Jean realizes with a cold feeling of dread that it isn’t by accident.

“Let me by,” he says, his attempt to sound authoritative undermined by the way his voice cracks in a way it hasn’t since he first started puberty. “Now.”

“He wants us to let him by,” the farmer says to his friends, who all laugh, as if it’s the peak of hilarity to antagonize a flustered kid. It’s stupid, and Jean knows it’s stupid, but something about the farmer’s sheer rudeness is impossible for him to walk away from or ignore. He’s just opened his mouth to let loose a blistering volley of insults that will most likely get him beaten up when suddenly Erwin appears on the other side of the farmer. The look on his face as he takes in the scene is flat, almost impassive, but his eyes . . .

The farmer turns his head to see what Jean’s looking at, and snorts when he sees Erwin. He even reaches up and pushes Erwin by the shoulder, the movement too distorted by alcohol to count as a shove but too aggressive to be a mere thump. “Be a shame if something happened to your kid. Outta watch ‘im better.”

“I will,” Erwin says, the look in his eyes menacing, the tone of his voice almost threatening. It shuts the entire table up. And then it’s gone, and he looks at Jean in such a nonchalant way that it’s obvious he’s ignoring the farmer and his buddies, like they aren’t worth another second of his consideration. “Come along, Jean. I’ve gotten us a room.”

Jean worms his way through the mass of bodies, aware of the dead silence that’s fallen across the entire room in their wake. He doesn’t feel safe until he reaches the stairs, where Erwin follows rather than leads him to their room.

Erwin takes off his cloak once they’re upstairs, then shrugs out of his jacket. The wings of the survey corps plastered all over him practically makes him a walking target for vitriol. Jean’s heard disapproving murmurs about the survey corps before and sometimes taken part in that kind of conversation himself, but he’s never seen someone approach a scout with outright, physical hostility before.

“They hate you,” Jean says as he double-checks that the door is locked. “I mean, we aren’t exactly hospitable toward the survey corps in Trost, but they really hate you.”

He expects to be met with silence again, but instead Erwin replies, almost off-hand, “That was one of the milder welcomes I’ve received.” Before Jean can say anything in response he says, “I’d rather discuss what you told me earlier.”

Jean tries to remember what exactly he’s said to Erwin over the course of the day, most of it angry, hunger-induced nonsense. “Uh.”

“You said your parents didn’t tell you anything about this arrangement.”

“Oh, that,” Jean says. “They first brought it up last week. All they said was that they’d decided I should go live somewhere else. I thought—I thought they’d set me up in an arranged marriage. With a rich girl my age.” It sounds absurd now that he’s said it out loud. At the time he didn’t know what to think; he certainly didn’t expect an arrangement like this. All things considered it could be worse.

Erwin frowns slightly. “I’m sure they meant well by leaving you in the dark, but it’s not fair to you.”

“It doesn’t matter. I mean—I just like to complain a lot. It doesn’t mean anything.” Jean shrugs. “If they’d told me ahead of time I probably would’ve run off somewhere just to be contrary. It’s done now. I’m fine.”

Erwin regards him silently for a few moments as he takes off his necktie and sets it on top of his cloak and jacket where he’s set them on the nightstand in a neatly folded pile. “I’ll take you back home tomorrow if you want me to.”

Jean feels a pang of homesickness then. The room is too large and quiet, and the view outside the window is too dark and empty, and he doesn’t belong here, any more than Erwin belonged on his doorstep in Trost. He almost nods, momentarily unable to speak, but then he thinks of what joining the military will mean for him, for his family. One less mouth for them to worry about feeding, at the least, and if he can manage to join the military police they’d be comfortable. Not rich, of course, but better off than they are now. With that in mind Erwin’s offer is almost insulting.

“I’m fine,” he says again, a little more testily than he intends. He begins to unbutton his shirt, trying his hardest not to let his hands shake. There’s no way Erwin believes him, but he at least respects Jean’s decision and drops the issue. He undresses down to his pants and strides across the room to put out the candle. With his back turned Jean can look at him without the risk of him looking back. Erwin’s torso is riddled with signs of a physical toll that’s almost nauseating to contemplate. There are scars, some of them small, some of them quite large and ugly. One in particular curves up along his side, where a faulty cable might have whipped back, or a blade might have snapped in half and cut him. There are dark, blotchy bruises blossoming at the junction of his arms and chest, and there’s a definite hobble to his gait that wasn’t there when other people were around to judge him for it.

“. . . _You_ aren’t fine,” Jean says before he can stop himself, “are you?”

Erwin turns around with the candle in his hand. It illuminates the hard lines of his face and the bags under his eyes, the way for once he doesn’t meet Jean’s gaze. “That’s irrelevant,” he says, then blows out the candle. In the dark Jean has a hard time seeing his own hands in front of his face, much less whether Erwin winces as he makes his way back to the bed, the creak of the floorboards accentuating the fact that he’s limping.

Even though they share the bed it’s just as strangely empty as everything else about Hildebrand and the journey it took to get here. Just last night Jean might have been grateful for the lack of feet in his face or elbows in his side and yet now he feels lost. He lies awake for what feels like the entire night, which isn’t exactly right, because he wakes up just as dawn breaks to find himself curled up against Erwin’s back.

It’s quiet in the room. He can’t even hear Erwin’s breathing, making it difficult to tell if he’s awake or not. Jean hopes that he isn’t. He closes his eyes again and figures it can’t hurt to lie here for a little while longer.


	3. Chapter 3

Ehrmich falls short of Jean’s grand expectations, fueled his entire childhood by second-hand rumors and anecdotes that, in retrospect, he realized blended in settings from more than one fairytale and fantastical bedtime story. It does have a snobbier atmosphere than Trost for sure and as a whole its architecture and citizens are more ostentatious and decorated than Jean is used to, but there’s still an unpleasant smell by the sewers and there are still kids like him running around up to no good. It’s not all that it pretends to be.

There isn’t an official survey corps headquarters here, due to a lack of funds. Instead they’re situated in a haphazard string of buildings near the southeast corner of the district. Being situated so close to the center of the kingdom makes it hard for them to go on expeditions beyond the walls, Erwin tells him, with the unspoken implication that this was purposeful on behalf of the king, since expeditions are tremendously costly and not often, in the public’s eye, worth a single begrudged cent. This is news to Jean. If you believed the talk back home, then the survey corps went charging out into titan-infested land every other week without a care in the world.

“You’ll be staying with me until your official training begins,” Erwin says after they leave the horse at the stables. “In the meantime I’ll be . . . tutoring you, I suppose.”

“Giving me a leg up, you mean?”

“I doubt I’ll give you any substantial advantage over the other recruits.” Erwin leads the way out of the stables, walking slow and steady to disguise his limp. “I can teach you about inter-wall politics and show you different exercises to improve your coordination with the gear, but I can’t do your actual training or earn your final evaluation for you.”

Jean cranes his neck and looks around as they walk. This section of the district is crawling with not only members of the survey corps but trainees—well, soon-to-be trainees—like him. A girl on the other side of the street carrying a large crate of supplies shuffles as fast as she can manage after an older officer. Jean’s taken off guard when a trio of boys dash out from a nearby alley and nearly bowl him over.

“Sorry!” one of them yells over his shoulder as his companions take off without him. “We’re late—gotta—”

He stops dead in his tracks and stares past Jean, no doubt at Erwin, and mouths something that looks suspiciously like a swear word Jean’s parents have always forbidden him from saying, then runs away after his friends before Jean can grasp what the hell his problem is.

“You’ll have plenty of time to get acquainted with the other recruits tomorrow night,” Erwin says, sounding rather far off. Jean has to dash to catch up with him. “Right now we need to get you settled in.”

Jean glances around one last time and gets the distinct feeling that everyone was staring at him before he noticed. He hurries up after Erwin, feeling more and more paranoid.

Erwin has a small house that gives Jean a neglected, unused impression. The small yard is a little overgrown and unruly, and the inside is sparse, devoid of any kind of decoration or even furniture beyond the very basics. The only extraneous things are the stacks of books piled up to a dozen high on the floor and window sills.

The bed looks like the least used thing in the entire house. Its sheets and quilt are tucked in precisely, its pillows new and undisturbed. Jean shrugs his rucksack off and thinks idly that his lack of possessions will fit right in. All the same, he feels a little self-conscious as he sets his clothes in the chest underneath the window and the horse carving on the sill.

Even though it’s not all that late in the afternoon he feels exhausted. He sits down on the bed, then flops over backward, and loses the will to budge even another centimeter. He kind of wants to meet the other trainees, but at the same time doesn’t really want to break his “how fast can he make everyone hate him” record quite so soon.

“Ugh . . . . wake me up when there’s food,” he groans.

“We take our meals at the mess hall,” Erwin says, and Jean groans louder.

He nods off at some point not too long after that, his sleep permeated by confusing, anxiety-ridden dreams that he can’t quite remember he wakes up. The room is pitch black when he finally rouses himself, stomach aching with hunger. For one bleary moment he thinks he’s back home in Trost, but it’s too still and quiet for that to be possible. The only indication that there’s even anyone else here is the faint but unmistakable smell of stew in the air.

He bumps into more than one stack of books as he tries to feel his way down the hall. Near the end is a slice of light leading from the kitchen, where he finds Erwin standing in front of a big pot. The table’s set with bowls, spoons, and a large chunk of bread. Jean’s stomach growls at the sight.

“What . . . what time is it?” he asks from the doorway, confused. It’s way past dinnertime; he can see the star-studded sky through the open window.

“Almost midnight,” Erwin says, turning to pick one of the bowls up from the table.

Jean’s mouth falls agape in surprise. “Why did you let me—why didn’t you try to wake me up?”

“I did. Several times.” Erwin gestures for Jean to sit. “After the fourth time I thought it’d be best to just let you sleep.”

Jean lingers in the doorway as he tries to figure out whether Erwin is kidding or not. It’s impossible to tell. He sits, hesitant until his hunger overrides his uncertainty. He wolfs down two bowls of stew as Erwin leafs through one of his books, then a second, then a third. By the time Jean’s done eating he’s assembled another small stack of books on the table, which he pushes toward Jean when he sets down his spoon.

“What’re these for?” Jean asks.

“Just some reading I’d like you to brush up on when you get the chance.” Erwin pauses. “Don’t be surprised if some of what you read is different from what you’ve been told in the past.”

The history book is the largest as well as the oldest-looking one in the stack. Jean pries it open delicately to find writing so tiny and cramped that it’s nearly illegible, filling the yellowed pages almost to the margins. He can’t make any sense of it until he brings the book up to his face. “You’re mean everything I’ve ever been told is a lie?”

“No, only that it might be just a small part of the truth. The same goes for that book and any of the others you might read here.”

Jean shuts the book, wrinkling his nose at the ensuing cloud of dust, and picks up a different book, this one small and leather-bound. Books were a rarity in Trost, literacy a useful but not entirely necessary skill. He himself wouldn’t ever have had any use for reading if his grandmother hadn’t insisted on it. For Erwin to have such a massive quantity of old books lying around. . . . “These books are forbidden, aren’t they?”

“Yes,” Erwin says without a trace of compunction. “So I would also advise you to not tell anyone about whatever thoughts you formulate after you read them, for both your sake as well as mine.”

It feels as though the book grows twice as heavy in Jean’s hand then. He sets it down and puts his hands in his lap. “So, what, you’re some kind of conspiracy freak like my grandfather was?”

Erwin pushes back from the table and, to Jean’s great non-surprise, dodges the question entirely. “While you’re here you’re more than welcome to read any of the books I have in the house, but again, only because I trust that you’ll keep them a secret and in readable condition.”

Jean bites his lip and worries at it for a second before saying, “Of course I will.” 

He wonders what about a bunch of dusty old books could possibly be worth the risk of imprisonment as he skims through the history book. It’s mind-numbingly dull and nigh-incomprehensible, and by noon the next day he’s given up on it entirely and is reluctant to even try to flip through the others. He puts them on the bedroom windowsill next to the horse carving and instead entertains himself by wandering the streets of Ehrmich for a few hours with his hands in his pockets. He can’t be gone for too much longer. There’s some event going on tonight that Erwin says they both need to attend.

What little interest he has in going dissipates when he returns to the house to find Erwin has discarded his uniform in favor of nice clothes, a dark blue coat with gold accents and knee-high boots over white pants that are—well—stunning is all that comes to Jean’s mind as he stands dumbly in the doorway to the bedroom.

“I, uh,” he manages to croak out, “I can’t go,” and tries to leave.

Erwin looks over as he finishes pulling on his gloves. “You have to, Jean,” he says, not impatiently, but still in a quietly self-assured tone that won’t brook the argument Jean’s trying to formulate. “It’ll do you good to get acquainted with some people your age before training begins.”

“I . . . I don’t have anything decent to wear,” Jean says through his teeth anyway, angry that he has to say it out loud even though Erwin already _knows_ the situation he’s in. “I’m not wearing my grandfather’s shirt again, it’s too big and—and horrible.”

“No one’s expecting you or any of the other trainees to dress up.” Erwin gestures to himself and Jean really wishes he wouldn’t, because he’s trying so hard not to stare at the creases at his elbows, at how snug his coat fits across his broad chest. “Truth be told, if I had the luxury of options I wouldn’t choose to wear something like this.”

What a crying shame, Jean thinks faintly as he turns to leave. If there’s no need for him to worry about dressing up then he’ll just go in these clothes, crusted with dust and dried sweat from his wanderings. No doubt he’ll leave everyone with an unflattering impression of himself, but he’d rather be seen as someone who’s a slob by choice and not just because he can’t afford a decent shirt and pair of pants of his own. He lags behind Erwin as they walk to the meeting hall, hoping that no one else on the street—and there’s quite a crowd—will see them and laugh to themselves at how differently they’re dressed. 

Erwin was right, though. The closer they get to the meeting hall the bigger the crowd is, and very few of the other up-and-coming trainees are dressed up to the degree that Erwin and the other officers are. A few of them are downright filthy, caked at the knees with what looks like mud but could very well be horse shit, if the smell is anything to go by. Jean runs right into Erwin’s side in his haste to keep away from them. It feels like running straight into a brick wall.

“Oh, there you are,” Erwin says, looking around and then down to where Jean’s trying to compose himself. “I have to meet with some people, but I’ll come find you as soon as we’re finished. There’s a fountain out back that I’ll meet you at in . . . let’s say an hour.”

A whole hour to himself—just great. He pushes his way into the meeting hall and looks around. It’s mainly a wide, empty floor with a staircase on the far wall. There are several long tables piled with food that he spends the next few minutes picking through despondently. There’s meat and bread and soup, but no cake. He considers sneaking out and just going back to Erwin’s house. 

He’s so absorbed in his own thoughts that he doesn’t notice the boy next to him until they both take a step in opposite directions and run right into each other. Jean’s sure he’s going to have a concussions before the night is done if this keeps up. He feels wetness seep into the front of his shirt and realizes that he’s made the boy spill his drink.

“Watch where you’re—” he starts to say impulsively, then shuts his mouth. The boy looks genuinely concerned as he takes off his jacket and hands it over.

“I’m really sorry,” he says, rubbing his nose as Jean scowls, pulls the jacket on, and holds it closed at the front, hiding the stain. “I spotted my friend and started walking without thinking. I didn’t even see you there.”

“Must be my fault for being too short,” Jean grumbles under his breath in an attempt to be gracious. “. . . Thanks for the jacket.”

“No problem,” the boy says, beaming. He sticks out a hand. “I’m Marco, by the way. Marco Bott.”

“Jean Kirstein,” Jean says, shaking Marco’s hand uncertainly, “from Trost.”

He regrets saying it even before the words are out of his mouth. Of course a ragamuffin like him is from Trost, a border town that’s isolated from the thick of things one way or the other, secluded and exclusive and more than a little boring. Jean finds there’s not one thing he can say about the place that would interest a non-native. Even _he_ doesn’t think it’s interesting.

There’s a brief, awkward silence after they introduce themselves. Around them is plenty of chatter from other trainees getting to know one another or, Jean notices as he glances around, greeting each other like old friends. He feels so out of place. Even Marco here has a friend he’s meeting and Jean’s been abandoned by the only person he sort of knows. He doesn’t know what to do.

“And that’s Mina,” Marco says, moving to Jean’s side and nodding toward a short girl who’s worming her way through the crowd toward them. “We’re cousins.”

Now that he mentions it Jean can see that they vaguely look like each other. They’re both fair-skinned and black-haired, but beyond that and maybe the fact that they’re both smiling there isn’t much family resemblance. Marco is taller than Jean by a good several inches and Mina is so short she only just comes up to Jean’s chin. They’re dressed differently, too. Mina’s wearing a plain, light green dress that’s only just long enough to hide what looks like a pair of scuffed up boots, whereas Marco is dressed up almost as nicely as Erwin was, and he definitely stands out because of it. Quite a few people are looking his way in appreciation and, when they notice that Jean’s got on his jacket, murderous jealousy. He feels unsafe.

“Why don’t we go outside?” he says, interrupting Marco and Mina as they begin greeting each other. “It’s hot in here.”

It’s hot outside, too, but without the crowd pressing in around them it’s a little more tolerable. Jean sits cross-legged on the edge of the fountain and plucks at his shirt, relieved to see that Marco had only been drinking water and not something that’ll stain and ruin one of the few shirts he owns. Mina sits beside him and kicks up her feet, revealing that she is indeed wearing a pair of heavy, oversized boots. She catches him staring and lifts up a leg.

“Ms. Eva’s dogs like to paw at my feet. Oh! You wouldn’t know who she is. She’s part of the wall garrison—I’m staying with her until training begins.” She laughs. “She’s one of my aunt’s friends. I’ve known her for years. Sometimes she buys me clothes, like this dress.”

She looks over at Marco with a mischievous look in her eyes. “Marco made out like a bandit, though— _he’s_ staying with a member of the military police. Some guy from a rich, important family.”

Jean scrutinizes Marco again, who smiles at him almost apologetically. “I’ve known him my whole life. He’s only a couple of years older than me so he treats me like his younger brother.”

“He treats you like someone he’d like to marry,” Mina says, causing the tips of Marco’s ears to flush a deep cherry red. She leans over and mutters to Jean, “Johann spoils him. I have to clean Ms. Eva’s house and Marco has time to come and sit around while I try to do my chores.”

It must be true, because Marco doesn’t say anything in return, just looks mildly embarrassed. Jean doesn’t see what there’s to be embarrassed about, considering he can’t be in want of anything basic like a good, sturdy roof, or in fear of something like not knowing if he’ll be able to afford medicine if he gets sick. Jean feels so jealous that it manifests as a deep, palpable ache in his chest. He can’t keep the bitterness out of his voice when he says, “Well, I have no idea who the hell Erwin is or what he does or why I’m stuck with him. I guess he owes my parents a favor or something—he wouldn’t _want_ to take me in if he didn’t have to. There’s no way.”

He glares down at the ground for a few moments, then looks up to see why Marco and Mina have fallen silent. They’re both staring at him in shock, Mina with her mouth slightly agape. They look as if Jean has viciously insulted their grandmother. “What?”

“Do you mean Erwin as in Erwin _Smith_?” Mina asks. In her excitement she presses in so close that her hair tickles the side of his neck.

“Well, yeah, he, uh—he—” Jean leans away in alarm. “You know who he is?”

“You _don’t_?”

“Obviously not,” Jean says, impatient.

“He’s the commander of the survey corps,” Marco says, running a hand through his hair. “He was promoted after Wall Maria fell. But, if you’re from Trost then I guess you wouldn’t have had much need to know that. I only know because Johann likes to stay up-to-date about that kind of thing. And Mina knows because—”

“Ms. Eva _fancies_ him,” she says, giggling. “Oh! Don’t tell her I told you that, Marco, she gets so flustered . . .”

“What else do you know about him? I only met him the day before yesterday so I have no clue what he’s like.” Well, that’s not quite true, but Jean would like someone else’s opinion of what kind of person Erwin Smith is. Marco and Mina both shrug and say they don’t really know, either. It’s not all that surprising, he supposes. Of course they wouldn’t.

“I’ve heard rumors about him, though,” Mina says, pulling her knees to her chest and resting her chin on her knees. “It’s probably a load of gossip and I shouldn’t pass it along, but . . . oh, never mind. Forget I brought it up.” She stares at him wide-eyed, obviously hoping he’ll prompt her to continue.

“What?” Jean demands.

“I’ve heard that he’s involved with _Captain Levi_ ,” she whispers, then pauses dramatically as if that’s supposed to mean anything to Jean. It apparently means something to Marco, because his mouth forms a little “o” of surprise and his ears go red again. “. . . You don’t know who that is, do you, Jean?”

He shakes his head.

“Well, now that you’re staying with him I’m sure you’ll meet Captain Levi eventually. If not you’ll at the very least hear about him. He’s the strongest soldier in the survey corps—probably the strongest one they’ve ever had.”

“I’ll keep that in mind, then,” Jean says, more to be polite than anything. He doesn’t know who this Captain Levi is and, to be quite frank, couldn’t care less. Who cares if he’s “involved” with Erwin? It’s not really anyone’s business, least of all his. Definitely not his. He tells himself that as he spots a blue coat across the yard and cranes his neck. It’s Erwin. He spots Jean and heads over, an odd expression threatening to break free from his typical stern one. He gives Jean a small smile as he comes to a stop in front of the fountain and looks from Mina to Marco, and Jean feels the most mortified that he’s felt this entire evening yet; Erwin thinks he’s made friends.

“This is Marco Bott,” Jean says, pointing at Marco, who offers his hand. “And Mina, uh . . . er—”

“Carolina,” she hisses, elbowing him in the side. “Carolina,” she repeats a little louder for Erwin’s benefit.

They chat for a bit while Jean clutches Marco’s jacket and considers flinging himself backward into the fountain. Erwin is surprisingly good at small talk, as long as it never focuses on him. He doesn’t seem quite as uptight, Jean thinks. He inquires after Ms. Eva and tells Mina to give her his regards, and listens quietly when Marco tells him how honored he is to meet him. Erwin’s eyes close at “honored” and don’t open again for a while, and for a minute Jean is afraid he might have died right then and there of pure shock.

After they leave and walk back to Erwin’s house, though, he grows more somber, and now Jean understands why, considering he’s the commander of the survey corps.

“I, uh . . . I had fun tonight,” he says as they pass by a group of trainees, who yell out insults so vulgar and slurred that they must be more than a little drunk. “Even though I didn’t think I would.”

He’s not sure why he thinks Erwin would care, but Erwin looks down at him and smiles again, more openly than he did at the fountain, so broad that Jean can see he has a dimple. It almost stops him dead in his tracks. “That’s good. I’m glad to hear that, Jean.”

Jean nods and walks a little faster so they’re not right by each other’s side. He almost trips over the stack of books in the entrance hall, recovering before Erwin steps through the door under the pretense of picking one of them up to read. He stumbles toward the bedroom, remembering that he hasn’t slept since he woke up before midnight the previous night. He’s so drained that he collapses onto the bed, wet shirt and all, and stuffs the book under his pillow to look at some other time. Erwin doesn’t come in after him. A light comes to life down the hall—he must be in his study. Jean figures Erwin can move him around once he gets tired enough to go to bed, and drifts off without too much more thought.

He dreams about Trost, plain boring Trost where he knew almost everyone’s name and almost everyone knew him as Friedrich Kirstein’s grandson, even though he himself had never gotten the chance to meet his grandfather, didn’t even know exactly who his grandfather was or why people used him as an insult. He remembers the dream when he wakes up and rolls over on his back, squinting when sunlight filters through the curtain and lands on his face. 

He sits up stiffly and pulls the shirt off, tossing it aside before curling back under the quilt. One thing about living in Trost that he doesn’t miss is all of the chores. He knows that this is only temporary, and that once he starts training his chores back home will seem cute in comparison, but for now he’s able to sneak in a couple extra hours of sleep, and he does so without a second thought.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I apologize for the slow updates and short chapter. I can't believe I've been working on this story for over half a year and it only has four small chapters! I've said over on the kink meme that I intend for the story to be in three parts and we're aaaalmost done with the first third. Hopefully the next part will be worth the wait. Thank you to everyone who's read so far!

Life in Erhmich is more relaxed than how it was in Trost, which at first surprises Jean and then, as the days drag on monotonously, stifles him. He has to consciously remind himself that it’s only temporary on days when he feels like tearing his hair out by the fistfuls, which is most of them. Training starts in two months and even back in Trost he heard enough horrible stories to have a healthy amount of sickening apprehension for it, but for the time being he has little to occupy his time with and it’s about to drive him up Wall Sina in frustration.

Erwin is as attentive as his duties allow him to be, which is considerably less than what Jean is used to. He works in his study while it’s light out, only getting up to stretch now and then. He keeps his jacket hung neatly over the back of his chair, allowing Jean to see the flex of his muscles underneath the tight fabric of his shirt from where he sits on the window sill. When he isn’t trying to sneak peeks at Erwin he tries his best to read through at least one of the books Erwin gave him. Before long he usually ends up either looking out at the window or daydreaming.

And for the first week that’s fine. It’s enough. Jean misses his family more than he thought he would, and he finds it’s easier to deal with by mulling it over than by burying his stress with menial activity. But just as soon as he gets somewhat accustomed to living here in this silent, pristine house with nothing other than the sight of Erwin’s perfect, unfaltering posture to greet him when he grows tired of looking out the window, everything changes again.

Erwin isn’t in his study when Jean wakes up around noon on the tenth day. Jean settles himself on the window sill anyway and braces himself for the second chapter of the history book. His eyes sweep mechanically across the pages without really absorbing what’s written and what it means, and before too long he sets it aside with a huff. 

He glances around glumly. Erwin’s study is filled with even more books—when the hell does he find time to read them? Where did he even get them?—that have the honor of being placed on actual shelves. Jean pokes around and notices they’re divided by subject and from there put in alphabetical order. 

There are yet more history books, quite a few medical books, and a small collection of what turns out to be journals, none of which are Erwin’s personally. One shelf is devoted entirely to volume upon volume about everything even remotely related to titans—first-hand accounts by scouts from expeditions stretching back over a decade ago, outdated gear maintenance manuals, even a single volume of what looks like a scripture for a cult of people who worship the titans, of all things.

Jean’s heart skips a beat as he eases a volume down at random and sits cross-legged on the floor to read it. Everyone knows that most history books are forbidden; there are some people who crave to own and read them simply because they’re forbidden. It’s never bothered Jean personally. He’s never had much of a reason or desire to learn the history of the world. 

What did it matter to him what life was like beyond the walls in the distant past? Before last week all he’d needed to know was how to look after his sisters and brother and help his parents with their work, nothing that a moldering book about gigantic bodies of salty, undrinkable water or long-forgotten civilizations and wars could teach him to do. Books about titans, though . . . it didn’t have any impact on Jean before and it still doesn’t, he thinks as he opens the book, his curiosity nonetheless getting the better of him.

It’s filled with diagrams of the speculated anatomy and behavior of titans. Jean has no way of knowing if the information is still current or if it was ever factual to begin with. It doesn’t matter since he’s never going to need to know anything about titans. To him they’re nothing more than a nasty rumor, and he plans on letting it stay that way. 

…It can’t hurt to read a little more, though.

The boards out in the hallway creak and he’s so absorbed in the book that he doesn’t think anything of it. They can’t be footsteps, because Erwin’s footsteps are heavy and still a little uneven. Jean sits on the floor until he’s flipped through the whole book of diagrams. When he’s done he stretches out his legs to shake out the numbness—and then he notices someone standing in the doorway. He’s so startled he scuttles back into the bookshelf and knocks down half of the section about agriculture.

There’s a boy paused in the doorway, dressed in simple clothes that are slightly too big for his lithe, compact frame. He looks Jean over with one cursory glance before curling his thin lip in what looks like distaste. Jean wonders if he’s broken into Erwin’s house with the intent to kill him and is just as disappointed to find it occupied only by Jean as Jean is, and then thinks: what if Erwin’s taken in two recruits? What if he’s stuck with this guy?

“Who’re you?” Jean asks suspiciously. The stranger ignores him and makes himself at home by touching all of the papers strewn across Erwin’s desk, the displeasure on his face intensifying tenfold. Maybe he’s trying to steal important survey corps information and maybe Jean should try to stop him, but Jean just clutches the book to his chest and watches, growing more and more confused, as the other boy organizes Erwin’s desk, transforming it from a cluttered war-zone into two neat stacks of paper and a fresh well of ink. 

Without so much as a second glance in Jean’s direction, he rolls up the voluminous sleeves of his shirt and leaves. He’s just passed through the doorway when he says in a startlingly deep voice, “Put those back in order.”

Jean’s too intimidated to be offended at being bossed around by some jerk he’s never met before. He scrambles to his feet and puts the books back before hunting the other guy down. He’s surveying the bed with his hands on his hips, back turned to Jean. He looked small from a distance, yet up close Jean can see that’s he’s much thicker, more muscular, than he seemed at first. His head jerks to the side, leering back at Jean from the corner of his eye, and Jean sees that he’s also older than he first assumed—a lot older.

“Who are you?” Jean repeats, then thinks maybe this guy will be more willing to respond if he introduces himself first. “I’m—”

“Jean Kirstein,” the man cuts him off impatiently. “Tell me, Jean, do you take pride in being an utter slob?” He points at the tangle of covers on the bed and cocks his head so he can look up at Jean with utmost disgust. Jean doesn’t see what the big deal is. Back home in Trost he and his siblings had always shared one huge blanket made by their grandmother—it isn’t his fault Erwin has more quilts and sheets on his bed than he actually needs, considering the fact that he never sleeps there, at least not to Jean’s knowledge. He’s come to the conclusion that Erwin must sleep at his desk, assuming he even allows himself to sleep at all these days.

Jean knows he has a temper, and most of the time he shoots off his mouth anyway. Not this time. He keeps his jaw firmly clenched and strips the bed when the man tells him to, as if he has any right to boss Jean around when he’s sauntered into someone else’s home like he belongs here. And how the hell does he know Jean’s name?

He can’t summon the nerve to ask such a simple thing, so he ends up relocating all of the books in the sitting room so the man can sweep the floor, only to tell Jean to stack all of the books back on the floor once he’s done.

“Are you kidding me?” Jean’s still en route to the kitchen table with the last armload of books. The look on the man’s face suggests he isn’t really the type to kid. Jean hauls all of the books back to the sitting room without another word of protest.

Before too long the man apparently decides things would go faster if he did whatever it is he’s doing on his own, at which point he begins to ignore Jean and continues to work in silence, sweeping and dusting with utmost care even though everything looks spotless, almost unnaturally so. Jean decides now is the time to make his escape and slips out of the house without a moment’s hesitation.

He hadn’t explored all of the district the week before and so spends the next couple of hours wandering around again. He feels self-conscious about the fact that he’s wearing a shirt he stole from Erwin’s closet, a too-big scrap of heavy cloth that looks like it’s been stitched up more than once in several different places. He needn’t have worried—the citizens of Ehrmich are far too caught up in their own daily affairs to pay any attention to him.

“Jean!”

At the sound of his name he pauses at the street corner he’d been crossing and backtracks a step. Jogging toward him is Marco, one arm outstretched in a wave. He slows down and doubles over a bit once he reaches Jean, laughing breathlessly. “Oh good . . . it is you. I told you, Mina . . . see?”

Mina grunts something in response from behind Marco. Jean hadn’t even noticed her there. He peers around Marco to find her grimacing, constricted by a dress with lacy frills at the collar and sleeves and small, fancy shoes that don’t look nearly as comfortable as her boots had.

“Whew! Haven’t seen you around for a while,” Marco says once he straightens up and pushes his bangs back from his forehead. “How have you been, Jean?”

Jean shrugs. “Could be worse.”

“Well, if you aren’t busy, Mina and I were just going back to Ms. Eva’s place, and I’m sure she wouldn’t mind if you dropped by with us.”

“I wouldn’t either,” Mina adds, grinning. “I could always use an extra pair of hands to help me out with my chores.”

“Tempting,” Jean says dryly. “I guess it wouldn’t hurt. I don’t have anything else to do.”

Marco claps him on the shoulder and steers him after Mina as she skips ahead and calls back, “C’mon, slowpokes!”


	5. Chapter 5

The tea Marco serves him is so bitter Jean wishes he could spit it back out. Instead he forces a smile, fakes a second slurping noise. Marco smiles, nose wrinkling, and pushes a small container of what is thankfully sugar across the table to Jean. 

“Help yourself, Jean,” Marco says, lifting up his own tea cup and keeping the saucer poised underneath it with practiced grace. Mina slaps his arm in reproach, causing the tea to slosh, and they glare at each other before descending into a fit of muffled giggles. Jean helps himself to as many sugar cubes as he can pick up with the tiny sugar cube tong at one time. The tea still tastes gross, so he supposes the problem must be with him.

It must also just be him that he can be sitting here in such a fancy house and feel so suffocated, imprisoned by his own fear of breaking something valuable or doing something rude without even realizing it. Ms. Eva has a maidservant, an elderly woman who had only acknowledged Jean’s presence long enough to make it obvious she didn’t think he compared to Marco, whom she was clearly fond of. What surprised Jean was that Mina seemed subservient to her in some way, despite not being a maid herself. Mina leaves the small room where they have tea several times over the course of the afternoon, summoned by the distant tinkling of a bell.

The house is not so much larger than Erwin’s modest home, and is likewise packed and stacked with so many things that only someone as young and small as Mina can squeeze through its labyrinth-like nooks and crannies to heed the bell so quickly. Jean hears barking and the muffled thumping of what must be dogs running through the house, the good wood of the floor protected from their nails by the assortment of rugs. Jean got the impression that Ms. Eva, while obviously of some kind of money, was not very concerned with putting on airs or impressing anyone, as befitting someone from the wall garrison.

“I don’t understand,” Jean says to Marco after Mina leaves again, holding the stiff hem of her dress up and scurrying off as fast as her pinchy-looking shoes will allow. “If she’s been taken in by such a rich lady then why does she do the housework?”

Marco sips his tea slowly and thinks. “Well, Mina’s parents aren’t—how do I put this . . . they aren’t quite as high-standing as her aunt’s family is, which they’re rather sensitive about it. Especially her father. So he refused to let Mina come stay here with Eva unless Mina did some kind of work in return, even though Eva doesn’t care about that.” Marco pours himself some more tea, keeping the ornate pot steady in his light grip. “It’s complicated. Johann says there aren’t really any official rules about this kind of thing we have—it’s very personal.”

Jean turns his cup in his hands, staring down at the dredges. “Are most trainees taken in by people they already know?”

“Usually, yes. Not always. Sometimes officers request to take in heirs to important families for monetary reasons. And then sometimes families are the one to offer children to prospective guardians. There are all kinds of reasons for it—it’s not always about love.”

“You love Johann?” Jean asks.

Marco chokes on his most recent mouthful of tea. “I d-didn’t say that,” he says hastily, pulling out a handkerchief from one of his pockets and patting at his mouth, prim and proper. “It’s just—sometimes—it’s like marriage, but—but not quite because we’re not, you know, married, we’re just—I—Oh Mina, there you are!”

Mina appears, flushed red in the cheeks. Following her is a willowy woman in uniform donned with the roses of the wall garrison. In her arms are two small, wiry-haired dogs that tremble and growl with hostility at Jean. He leans back in his cushy armchair, keeping his eyes on the little gray menaces as they are handed off to Mina and Marco to hold, while the woman bends slightly at the waist and extends a sunburned hand for Jean to shake.

“You must be Jean,” she says, her sunburned face kind behind a thin curtain of unkempt curly hair, as golden brown as honey. The skin of her hand is almost as rough as Erwin’s, and she looks nearly as muscular, if the tightness of her cropped jacket is any indication. “Please, call me Eva.”

“Nice to meet you,” Jean says, watching in disbelief as Eva sits down on the empty half of the loveseat and Mina lets go of the dog she was holding. It snuffles over the Eva’s lap and settles there, its little stump of a tail quivering in barely suspended aggression as it keeps its face pointed at Jean. Eva strokes its head lovingly. “I, uh, like your dogs.”

Eva beams, tickling the dog under its chin. “So tell me, Jean, how are you liking Ehrmich so far?”

Jean shrugs. “S’okay. I don’t really have anything to do.”

“Oh, is that so? What a shame. Though I suppose it is hard for Commander Erwin to take up much time with you, considering his station.” It begged the question of why Erwin agreed to take Jean in the first place.

“Yeah. It doesn’t bother me too much.” Before too long they would all begin training, and then it would be difficult for all of them to find time to see each other.

“Well,” Eva says, smiling, “you’re more than welcome to come keep Mina whenever you want.”

“Mrs. Falk will just put him to work,” Mina interjects, glancing at Marco. Marco shrugs helplessly and gulps down the rest of his tea.

Jean wonders then about the rude man who made him rearrange the books at Erwin’s house. Perhaps he was hired help . . . except Erwin was not wealthy. Whoever he was, Jean hoped he wouldn’t still be there by the time he returned, and that Erwin would be there instead.

Marco walks him home after they bid Mina and Eva goodbye. The sun has begun to go down despite the early hour, and the air is crisp and chilly. Jean will need a new coat for the winter. He knows that Marco must notice his shivering, and is both annoyed and a little relieved when Marco offers to bring one of his spare jackets the next time they meet.

“Is tomorrow fine?” Marco asks when they reach Erwin’s gate. Jean nods. “Good. I’ll see you after lunch then. Stay warm.”

Jean watches him go down the street, his hands stuck under his arms for warmth. As they walked side by side he’d noticed, not for the first time, that Marco was taller than he was, and broad not from baby fat but more from natural muscle. He was terribly cute, Jean thought appraisingly. Perhaps that was why Johann wanted to marry him, if such a thing were even possible. In Trost it certainly wasn’t, but here within Wall Sina he felt that maybe such things could be permissible.

He enters the house with trepidation, peering through the front hall with his eyes narrowed and ears strained. A light is on in the bedroom, falling across the hallway. When the door shuts behind Jean with a loud creak Erwin’s voice calls, “Is that you, Jean?”

Jean finds him sitting on the edge of the bed, undoing the straps of his uniform. He watches from the doorway, as genuinely curious about the process as he is in watching the movements of Erwin’s body.

“Do you always have to wear that?” Jean asks.

“When I’m on duty, yes.”

“Why? In case the titans attack?”

There was more than a little sarcasm in his voice, which is coolly ignored. “Yes. Though the gear itself is useless if you aren’t prepared to use it creatively,” Erwin says, leaning forward to set the mass of straps on the dresser, then down to pull off his boots.

“Creatively,” Jean repeats.

“Training drills will only take you so far. You will need to practice on your own time.” Erwin looks him in the eye then, without expression. “Even then if you don’t think of the titans as a serious threat you will never be prepared enough.”

Jean bites down on the inside of his cheek at the unexpected reprimand, a small part of him wary that he might have made Erwin mad. It’s so hard to tell.

But then Erwin looks away, and it becomes irrelevant. “I bought something for you, by the way.”

“How?”

“With money.”

Jean resists the urge to roll his eyes and sits down cautiously at Erwin’s side. Erwin lifts up his survey corps cloak to reveal a plain, single-breasted overcoat. Jean takes it, surprised. It looks and feels new, not the slightest bit worn or surreptitiously patched together.

“Be sure to take that with you whenever you go out,” Erwin goes on. “Winter comes quickly here.”

Jean nods, staring down at the coat, unsure what to say. He should thank Erwin, he knows, yet when he makes to speak for some reason he says, “It’s still not a kiss.”

Erwin holds an arm out. Jean lets himself be pulled close, a little uncertain, a little eager. More than anything he’s suspicious that Erwin will trip him up again. He warms up in Erwin’s arms, leaning back against his chest, burrowing himself in the warmth. Sure enough all Erwin does is press a kiss to the top of his head. He doesn’t let go, however, and Jean thinks that this is almost just as nice.

“Do you miss your family?” Erwin asks.

“A little.”

“If you write them a letter I’ll have it sent to them.”

“They haven’t written to me,” Jean mutters.

“I think they want you to have some space,” Erwin says, his voice quiet and reassuring. “They haven’t forgotten about you.”

“If you’re so sure. I’ll write them tomorrow, then.” Jean turns his head and cranes his neck. “Do you sleep?”

“Of course.”

“Then sleep in here. My parents won’t like it if you let me freeze to death.”

“One might think I should buy you a coat,” Erwin says, leaning back when Jean pokes him in the ribs. “Go on to sleep, Jean. I’ll be back shortly. I have some more things to take care of.”

Jean lies awake, glad now for the excess of blankets and the heavy coat. True to his word Erwin comes back a couple of hours later, his feet cold as ice when Jean stretches one of his own out under pretense of rolling over in his sleep.

Erwin laughs in a way that makes Jean feel good, not like he’s being made fun of. “Good night, Jean.

“. . . Good night, Erwin.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The fact that most of the chapters end with Jean going to sleep is intentional and somewhat meaningful, I swear.


End file.
